Apple thriving on 25th anniversary of the Mac

Born at a time when people assumed desktop computers were all about text, the primarily visual Macintosh is marking its 25th anniversary on a mostly high note with some of its best-ever sales and influence beyond just desktop computers.

The design was originally envisioned in the late 1970s by early Apple employee Jef Raskin as a truly accessible computer that didn't require the at times arcane text commands of most computers.

Based heavily on ideas from Xerox's PARC research facility, the original Macintosh 128K was formally launched January 24th, 1984 as the first mainstream computer to depend on the concepts of a mouse pointer, a windowed desktop, icons and folders. It wasn't Apple's first system of the kind -- the Lisa was launched just over a year earlier -- but it was the first to be priced at a level average (if still well-off) people could afford, initially costing $2,495 where the Lisa had been priced four times higher.

Most now acknowledge that the design is ultimately the father of the modern computer, though the truth is that the system initially struggled to gain acceptance. Besides a high price well beyond the pure cost, many weren't ready to embrace the notion of a mouse-driven control scheme. The visual interface was not only a radical break that was deemed too simple but was considered a large barrier to developing software. And while Apple co-founder Steve Jobs is often credited with helping guide the original design and backing it as the future of the company he helped create, his increasing conflicts with then-CEO John Sculley forced him out in 1985.

Sales of the Mac cooled after the early rush, but climbed upwards again through the second half of the 1980s and built up a reputation for the Mac as a content creation standard in an era when Windows was still considered an inferior parallel and most non-Mac computers had command line interfaces. The era introduced color displays, expandability, hard drives, and even the first notebook in the form of 1989's Macintosh Portable: a 16-pound, $6,500 behemoth whose battery technology was crude enough that people couldn't even run the system on AC if the battery was drained.

The original Macintosh 128K desktop.

The 1990s were, by contrast, a rollercoaster for the Mac. Although Apple is often touted as pioneering the modern notebook's clamshell design with 1991's PowerBook 100 as well as a mainstream 32-bit operating system in System 7 the same year, the advent of Microsoft's Windows 3.0 and later Windows 95 eventually swung the advantage away from the Mac. Users eventually got a very similar and at times better experience to the Mac from commodity PCs; from 1995 onwards, Windows systems were capable of true multitasking where even Mac OS 9 was limited in terms of how programs could run in the background.

Intel's rise throughout the 1990s also eroded at least some of Apple's perceived performance edge, and Apple's tendency towards very high profit margins and an extremely large product range gradually turned many users away from the Mac towards lower-priced and now more capable PCs. Executive management even greenlit Mac clones that were regularly cheaper than Apple's own products. The decline in market share was steep enough that, by the mid-1990s, many observers were convinced Apple was nearing its end.

Most already know the story that follows from the company's late 1990s turnaround. After taking Steve Jobs back on as first its temporary and later permanent new CEO, Apple released the first iMac in 1998 and effectively reversed its fortunes overnight, returning to its roots with a design that sparked renewed interest in genuinely appealing, ergonomic design in computers and for electronics as a whole.

The first iMac from 1998.

Since then, Apple has often positioned the Mac as an attractive, premium-priced but easy to use computer and has regularly been the first to popularize certain design or technology trends: while it wasn't first with USB or Wi-Fi, the Cupertino-based company was the first to encourage their use. Thin, widescreen notebooks also owe much of their now ubiquitous popularity to the titanium PowerBook G4 of 2001. Mac OS X's appearance also gave Apple a modern operating system that itself was first with mainstream features like the use of 3D effects, easy built-in device syncing, and widgets for quick access to information.

Macs have at times floundered in the early part of the 21st century. The Power Mac G4 Cube, though still cherished as one of the most unique computer designs yet, was quickly stifled as its price and performance trailed behind. And lagging PowerPC development by both IBM and Motorola frequently left Apple struggling to justify performance differences and ultimately pushed the company to switch to Intel processors.

But by now, 25 years after the first model was headed to stores, the Mac is considered at or near its zenith. In the past three years, the platform has steadily climbed back in market share to where it claimed nearly 10 percent of US sales this past summer. Macs are continuing to register significant sales growth even as the PC industry declines in a battered world economy. Apple's systems are still popularly seen as design leaders and, due to the Intel switch, now regularly perform as well or sometimes better than many Windows PCs with similar hardware.

Apple has lately positioned the Mac as a true eco-friendly computer with aluminum, glass and energy-efficient processors now almost ubiquitous throughout its lineup.

And the Mac is now showing signs of breaking out from the familiar notions of desktops and notebooks. While the interfaces are radically different, the Mac's operating system underpins the Apple TV media hub, the iPhone and the iPod touch, all devices which embrace the philosophy of a simple, visual interface and which (in the case of the iPhone and iPod) are virtually small computers themselves.

In characteristic fashion, Apple isn't waxing nostalgic and (as of this writing) has done nothing to commemorate the anniversary of the computer that still defines its business. The company has even gone so far as to pull out of Macworld Expo for 2010 despite the show having been around for almost as many years as the Mac itself. Still, as one of the cornerstones of the PC industry and the reason for AppleInsider's existence, the Mac has and will hopefully continue to have an impact on computers for many years to come.

I'm just thankful that Apple continues to march to the beat of its own drum. Just think of what the company would be like if it actually listened to all the armchair engineers, marketing geniuses, and financial wizards that post in forums like AppleInsider. It be like...like...Windows.

I can remember 1/24/1984 well, when I drove to Empire Electronics in Burien, WA (south of Seattle) to watch in awe as a salesperson demonstrated MacPaint to a throng of onlookers. I ended up buying one with a carrying case a few days later, and then I picked up an Apple 1200 baud modem and MacTerminal days (weeks?) later, and finally picked up an ImageWriter to cap everything off. When I later upgraded it to a Mac Plus, I wish I could've kept the original rear of the case that had everyone's signatures engraved into the plastic. I remember the lean (i.e, "Habadex") days of software development, and rejoiced when Microsoft came out with Multiplan for the Mac. One of my favorite programs was a database program called OverVue - a predecessor to ProVue's Panorama, which is still being made today. I remember Borland's Reflex relational database program, and I really remember getting my hands on Silver Surfer database, which went on to become 4D. I remember the first time that I played with Hypercard. I remember Apple dropping off the first Mac II to my work location (at one of the Baby Bell phone companies) before it went on sale so I could evaluate it. Lots of good memories over a lot of years. Congrats, Apple!

Most already know the story that follows from the company's late 1990s turnaround. After taking Steve Jobs back on as first its temporary and later permanent new CEO, Apple released the first iMac in 1998 and effectively reversed its fortunes overnight, returning to its roots with a design that sparked renewed interest in genuinely appealing, ergonomic design in computers and for electronics as a whole.

On January 2, 1998, I got a call from an Apple Employee customer to take a look at the commissioned sales numbers. I worked for MCI Systemhouse supporting Apple's IT department in Napa, CA. One of my responsibilities was to support a system to process commissions for Apple's sales force. Those numbers she saw were from the G3 desktop systems which Apple released the previous summer.

Later that January at MacWorld 1998, Steve Jobs would give the first of his many "Just One More Thing" announcements when he pre-announced Apple's profit for the previous quarter.

Last year I sent Steve Jobs a suggestion that Apple set up a Network Marketing organization for Apple products, headed by Guy Kawasaki. Guy liked the thought, but Steve was silent. Of course, I could set up such an organization myself...

The Mac is still on an UPWARD, POSITIVE slope. Until the slope is downward, negative it is incorrect to state that the Mac is "at or near its zenith."

The Mac may continue to go hyperbolic for many years. After all, there are still over 5 billion people without a computer. And, a recent comment from Apple was that almost 50% of Apple store purchases are by Windows users.

I can remember 1/24/1984 well, when I drove to Empire Electronics in Burien, WA

Hey! I also have memories of Empire Electronics! I grew up in Burien. I was 13 in 1984 and could never afford a Mac with my paper route money... (I could barely afford half of the VIC-20 that I went in on with my brother.) But I would wander in there every once in a while and look at all those amazing machines.

Hey! I also have memories of Empire Electronics! I grew up in Burien. I was 13 in 1984 and could never afford a Mac with my paper route money... (I could barely afford half of the VIC-20 that I went in on with my brother.) But I would wander in there every once in a while and look at all those amazing machines.

Hey! I also have memories of Empire Electronics! I grew up in Burien. I was 13 in 1984 and could never afford a Mac with my paper route money... (I could barely afford half of the VIC-20 that I went in on with my brother.) But I would wander in there every once in a while and look at all those amazing machines.

I finally did buy a Mac in 2008.

Now that is a switcher story!
Doing a paper route for 24 years to save up for a Mac.

I, for one, am glad I stuck with Apple. The 1990s were rough, though. There was many a time that I came close to jumping ship, but every time I was ready to call it quits, Apple would push the envelope just that little extra bit to keep my involvement going.

Until it got to the Cube. Then, there was no turning back..... it's been Apple all the way! (The Cube is still my all-time favorite machine, followed by the MacBook Pro in 2001 or so?).

"The design was originally envisioned in the late 1970s by early Apple employee Jef Raskin as a truly accessible computer that didn't require the at times arcane text commands of most computers."

That first paragraph is completely wrong.

Raskin has overstated his case, and people who want to knock Jobs have seized upon that. Did this writer ever see this "design" supposedly by Raskin? Done in the "late 1970s"? What ~ before Raskin had even seen SmallTalk?

This design (the one in the top picture) had little to do with Jef Raskin.

He WROTE a plan for a $500 computer without really knowing how to engineer such a machine. Raskin's proposal had NO MOUSE ~ hardly the Mac then, is it?

On the contrary, after Jef Raskin was shown (with others) the amazing paradigm at PARC (which included SmallTalk), he is reported to have said to Larry Tesler, "We don't need this, but I'm glad they saw it."

If Jobs had listened to Apple, that paradigm ~ unappreciated by Xerox ~ would have remained in a lab, or maybe been bought by someone else.

APPLE BOUGHT IT, admittedly not for much ~ partly because the "wizards" at Palo Alto so badly wanted to see their vision become reality ~ and partly because Apple thought (and they were right) that it would take time and several millions to turn this into a viable product.

(Those involved have their names inside the original casing. And they don't recall things the same way as Jef Raskin)

The deal was (I believe) made in December 1979 and it would take until January 1984 to become commercial reality as the Macintosh. And it nearly failed.

It would seem that Aidan Malley (and many more on these forums) really do need to read Steven Levy's book 'Insanely Great'.

And to correct another (tiresome) urban myth restated elsewhere: Apple DID NOT STEAL 'The Mouse' from Xerox. The people at Xerox PARC had incorporated into their scheme this neglected invention from the 1960s made by Douglas Engelbart.

Wikipedia him to see the vast improvement Apple made upon it, using a license paid to SRI, who held the patent. Sadly, typically, Engelbart himself got no royalties.

The "one button" thing came out of those four years of development when Apple research found that secretaries worked best that way ~ though they had tried two- and three-button devices. (The picture on the Wikipedia page doesn't show it, but Engelbart's original had 3 buttons)

"The design was originally envisioned in the late 1970s by early Apple employee Jef Raskin as a truly accessible computer that didn't require the at times arcane text commands of most computers."

That first paragraph is completely wrong.

Raskin has overstated his case, and people who want to knock Jobs have seized upon that. Did this writer ever see this "design" supposedly by Raskin? Done in the "late 1970s"? What ~ before Raskin had even seen SmallTalk?

This design (the one in the top picture) had little to do with Jef Raskin.

He WROTE a plan for a $500 computer without really knowing how to engineer such a machine. Raskin's proposal had NO MOUSE ~ hardly the Mac then, is it?

On the contrary, after Jef Raskin was shown (with others) the amazing paradigm at PARC (which included SmallTalk), he is reported to have said to Larry Tesler, "We don't need this, but I'm glad they saw it."

IF JOBS HAD LISTENED TO RASKIN, that paradigm ~ unappreciated by Xerox ~ would have remained in a lab, or maybe been bought by someone else.

APPLE BOUGHT IT, admittedly not for much ~ partly because the "wizards" at Palo Alto so badly wanted to see their vision become reality ~ and partly because Apple thought (and they were right) that it would take time and several millions to turn this into a viable product.

(Those involved have their names inside the original casing. And they don't recall things the same way as Jef Raskin)

The deal was (I believe) made in December 1979 and it would take until January 1984 to become commercial reality as the Macintosh. And it nearly failed.

It would seem that Aidan Malley (and many more on these forums) really do need to read Steven Levy's book 'Insanely Great'.

And to correct another (tiresome) urban myth restated elsewhere: Apple DID NOT STEAL 'The Mouse' from Xerox. The people at Xerox PARC had incorporated into their scheme this neglected invention from the 1960s made by Douglas Engelbart.

Wikipedia him to see the vast improvement Apple made upon it, using a license paid to SRI, who held the patent. Sadly, typically, Engelbart himself got no royalties.

The "one button" thing came out of those four years of development when Apple research found that secretaries worked best that way ~ though they had tried two- and three-button devices. (The picture on the Wikipedia page doesn't show it, but Engelbart's original had 3 buttons)

Next week - the Iconic 1984 Apple superbowl commercial announcing the mac - still the best ever - has 25th anniversary as well. Next Sunday would be an interesting time to launch a 25th anniversary edition imac with something more than a mac/PC clone commercial. This is just an observation of an opportunity, not a prediction.

As an architect, harnessing the power of computers to help create the drawings of a building has been a dream since my student days. 30 years ago you needed technicians to input simple data, and 2 days later you would get a shaky wireframe 3D rendering.

For me, AutoCad on the PC was the first chance to use a computer for design. I learned all the DOS commands (33 of them?) I needed to make it work, and learned to write down the filenames so I could make the commands work, such as changing the name of a file or deleting it.

Then, an actress friend went on tour and lent me her Mac Plus (actually upgraded from 128k). I remember the frustration I felt when I couldn't find the Mac equivalent of the DOS command to re-name the file, even though I could see it graphically, and my surprise when I eventually clicked the mouse on the file's name and suddenly found I could just click on the name and change it........

That was my Eureka moment: I was looking for something that was difficult and the Mac made it so easy .....................

"The design was originally envisioned in the late 1970s by early Apple employee Jef Raskin as a truly accessible computer that didn't require the at times arcane text commands of most computers."

That first paragraph is completely wrong.

Raskin has overstated his case, and people who want to knock Jobs have seized upon that. Did this writer ever see this "design" supposedly by Raskin? Done in the "late 1970s"? What ~ before Raskin had even seen SmallTalk?

This design (the one in the top picture) had little to do with Jef Raskin.

He WROTE a plan for a $500 computer without really knowing how to engineer such a machine. Raskin's proposal had NO MOUSE ~ hardly the Mac then, is it?

On the contrary, after Jef Raskin was shown (with others) the amazing paradigm at PARC (which included SmallTalk), he is reported to have said to Larry Tesler, "We don't need this, but I'm glad they saw it."

IF JOBS HAD LISTENED TO RASKIN, that paradigm ~ unappreciated by Xerox ~ would have remained in a lab, or maybe been bought by someone else.

[...]

It would seem that Aidan Malley (and many more on these forums) really do need to read Steven Levy's book 'Insanely Great'.

[...]

According to Raskin, he frequented PARC prior to joining Apple... he found like minded folks there to discuss UI ideas. He also claims to have been the one that originally wanted Jobs to visit PARC in the hopes that Jobs would finally understand the kinds of things he wanted to do. Raskin's 1967 thesis "A Hardware-Independent Computer Drawing System Using List-Structured Modeling: The Quick-Draw Graphics System" was on bit-mapped graphics and WYSIWYG UIs (apparently Apple got the name "QuickDraw" from Raskin too).

Also according to Raskin he developed the click-drag technique, and argued for a one button mouse in a memo to Larry Tessler (a former Xerox PARC employee at Apple, see: http://mxmora.best.vwh.net/JefRaskin.html).

Apparently Markkula originally wanted Raskin to look at developing a $500 game machine, but Raskin wasn't interested. He counter-proposed an easy to use computer for the masses at the same price point, and that was agreed to. Raskin's early notes on the Macintosh (then called Annie) project talk about a computer in "one lump" with a handle which sounds familiar... see: http://library.stanford.edu/mac/prim...hrophilic.html.

While clearly Raskin had little to do with the final implementation, it is also fairly clear that the final product is heavily influenced by his ideas (modeless GUI) and project goals. It is also true Raskin was not completely happy with the way it turned out... he thought it should have been even easier to use.

One thing I didn't realize until reading some of these documents: Job's Lisa did not originally have a GUI...

Good article, but the innovative hardware was only half the story of apple's resurgence. Apple fans will recall the desperate days of the early 90s when it was painfully obvious that MacOS could no longer cut it against Windows NT in areas like crash protection, multi-tasking and so on. Apple started several find-a-new-OS initiatives (Pink, Taligent, ...) none of which did much more than flop around like a fish on the beach.

It wasn't until Jobs returned and settled the OS argument once and for all that developers could safely return to the Mac. Fortunately for us, he chose an OS with industrial-strength underpinnings (UNIX) and (did he know this would happen?) made consequently made the Mac a useful tool for work in fields such as life sciences. Goodbye $20000 SGI workstation, hello PowerBook.

I'm just thankful that Apple continues to march to the beat of its own drum. Just think of what the company would be like if it actually listened to all the armchair engineers, marketing geniuses, and financial wizards that post in forums like AppleInsider. It be like...like...Windows.

It is likelikeWindows.

It now uses Intel chips, can boot to Windows, most files require file extensions, the OS has become a hardware hog and so complex that when things go wrong it can be a right pain in the arse.

It even gave me a Blue Screen of Death last week.

It has increasingly been marketed to the techno-ignorant masses with glossy trinkets and pointless and inconsistent visual changes to the UI. The professional users are repeatedly told they are not the market, after being told they are the market, when they hit the problems thrown up by half baked technology.

The Mac mainstream advantages have been thrown to the dogs whenever Apple feels like it, and we are left with odd premonitions of other axes yet to fall as Mac is removed from the OS name, alt replaces option and FireWire finds itself half out the door.

OSX will become more and more like Windows the more popular it gets, and then there'll be a new underdog that'll be 'cool' to support and the focus will shift again. Swings and roundabouts, that's all.

The Mac mainstream advantages have been thrown to the dogs whenever Apple feels like it, and we are left with odd premonitions of other axes yet to fall as Mac is removed from the OS name, alt replaces option and FireWire finds itself half out the door.

I tested a Lisa when it came out. When the Mac came out, I became a user as my university had the good idea to buy a few.

I've used Macs on and off since then, as well as Windows. In my experience, OS/9 stunk, and OS/X is miles better. Not that OS/9 was really bad, but it was old and unstable in comparison to Windows NT. The GUI was nicer, but that was the end of it. Certainly nothing to look back upon as the good old days.

In fact, before OS/X and between Windows NT and Windows 2000, I was regularly recommending PC's to anybody who would ask me, so long as they didn't run Windows 95/98/Me.

But then OS/X came out, the hardware became compelling again, and Microsoft got stuck in XP, which was little more than a bloated 2000. I don't even need to mention Vista.

So Macs became the clearly better choice around 2002 or so, and are even more so now. Also, Cocoa is a wonderful development environment, much leaner than .Net could ever hope to be.

Sure there are some GUI inconsistencies, but Mac/OS was never perfect. Not all times past were better. Leopard is a fine OS and if they have been making it leaner, Snow Leopard will be even better.

I clicked on the links. My problem is: I'm not sure if I can believe Jef Raskin. He has lodged papers with Stanford that seem 'constructed' to put himself in a favorable light for posterity.

Everyone (certainly in the Macworld, and maybe even in the Parallel Cosmos) has probably heard of Steve Jobs' 'Reality Distortion Field'. And never in a kind way. I've thought about this, and considered 'Who's to say Jef Raskin didn't have a Reality Distortion Field of his own?' I think we are dealing with a massive ego.

You'll notice the source of all this... is Jef Raskin. You will notice he never seems to want, say, Bill Atkinson to get more recognition. I wasn't there. So what can I do? Well, at the risk of being wrong, I have tended to trust people like Steven Levy and 'Robert X. Cringely' because they have seemed more objective to me.

How is it in interviews with the latter, none of the people who were secretly creating all our futures at Xerox PARC tells it the way Raskin does? All these great things he thought of... who's to say he thought of them first? Seeing what became the Macintosh, he says, "oh, it should have been easier"... words to that effect.

SO GO JEF! ~ go and make a better and easier Macintosh! Why didn't you go and DO all the things you claim you thought of or wanted to see done?

Raskin claims it was him "arguing for a one-button mouse" but the science journalist Steven Levy explains that came from research using secretaries. There would be no need for an argument, it seems to me ~ just an acceptance of the data.

Okay, Jef was peeved because Jobs has "forced him out". I get tired hearing (not from you, bud, but elsewhere many times) "oh... Steve Jobs took the credit..." Well, actually, he never did. Steve Jobs never claimed to have 'invented the Macintosh' ~ he was always a front-man for a team of people. (Maybe Jef just can't admit, he was a lousy team player?)

Jobs is one guy. Why didn't Wozniak see the greater merits of Raskin and fight for his pimacy of place? Why didn't the rest of Silicon Valley (all these visionaries) compete to put Jef Raskin's better world into reality?

Someone DESCRIBING a computer, whether in advance with prescience ~ or afterwards with hindsight ~ has not "invented" anything!